


A Different Fate

by Sunja



Category: Assassin's Creed - All Media Types, Assassin's Creed Valhalla
Genre: Eivor has a bad time, Fulke is her own warning, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-09
Updated: 2020-12-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 17:53:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27980304
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sunja/pseuds/Sunja
Summary: Fulke takes Eivor instead of Sigurd.
Relationships: Eivor & Sigurd Styrbjornson
Comments: 20
Kudos: 96





	A Different Fate

**Author's Note:**

> I have been thinking about this since playing that whole story arc. If anyone wants to make this into a bigger, longer fic, please do. I would do it myself, but I suck at long fics. 
> 
> Warnings in end note.
> 
> Edit: If you ever read this, you‘ll know that I‘m addressing you. It‘s okay to reuse ideas. It‘s okay to expand on what someone else came up with. That‘s what fanfiction is all about. But when you deliberately use someone else’s ideas, it’s common curtesy to ask or at least mention them in the notes. AO3 even has a feature to say your work was inspired by another. It was not my intention to make you delete your first fanfiction and I hope I didn‘t discourage you from writing and posting in the future. I‘m happy that you liked my fic enough to write your own version, I just would like to be mentioned if you post it.

There it was. 

Finally. 

Maybe now that Sigurd had seen his stupid stone, they could move on. Eivor was just about ready to get back to the task at hand, which was finding allies in England, not chasing after stories of mythical tablets. What was so special about it anyways. Eivor could see it from here and it was just a stone tablet with some runes etched in it. 

Now that he thought about it, they looked kind of familiar. But their meaning eluded him. Like a thought he’d just had but forgotten or like the feeling of sudden familiarity of a situation that hadn’t happened before. Eivor shook his head. This was just some kind of dark seidr. Some magic the women Fulke had cast. 

But Sigurd seemed to understand the runes. Or at least he was able to read them. 

Eivor huffed and crossed his arms, finding both Basim and Fulke looking at him. Basim seemed curious, Fulke was just studying him from the corner of his eye. 

Eivor didn’t like it. 

But now they had seen the stupid stone, so it didn’t really matter. They wouldn’t be needing Fulke anymore anyways. 

-

King Aelfred wasn’t what Eivor had expected. He wasn’t sure what he had expected exactly, but the man was thin and while his gaze was piercing and his presence looming in this dark tent, he wasn’t all that intimidating. 

Aelfred wasn’t the problem. Eivor was quite sure that he was not to be underestimated when it came to strategy and politics, but what worried Eivor more was the direction the conversation was heading. An exchange of hostages. 

As soon as the words “my best warrior” were uttered he stiffened. Aelfred wouldn’t know it, sure, but Sigurd, Basim and Eivor knew well enough that Eivor was the best fighter among them. Sigurd and Basim were both formidable, but Eivor knew that he himself had a drive, a fury when fighting that gave him the edge. Sigurd looked over at him and Eivor knew he was going to order him to stay. Eivor wasn’t sure what he would do then. 

“I volunteer myself…”, Basim began and Eivor both breathed a sigh of relief and felt his heart sink as the realization sank in that they wouldn’t all walk out of this tent. 

And then Fulke ran forward. And she bowed. And Aelfred knew who she was. A Paladin of the Order Basim was hunting. 

“Are you with this company, Paladin Fulke?” Eivor didn’t like how interested Aelfred sounded. 

“I was. To recover what’s rightfully mine.” Fulke rose back to her feet and strode over to Aelfred’s throne. With confidence. With obvious familiarity. 

“Eivor Wolf-Kissed is the only one worth taking. He is the greatest warrior they have, he single-handedly united several Dane and Saxon Earldoms. He denies the presence of our Lord and has defiled several Holy Places.” 

Eivor felt ice cold dread grip his heart and without consciously doing so he had fallen in a fighting stance and drawn his axe. Whatever Fulke wanted with him, he would kill her before finding out. If this was how he started his journey to Valhalla, he would make it a tale worth telling. 

All around him lances and swords were drawn. 

“Eivor!”, Sigurd yelled from next to him. Eivor looked over at him reluctantly. Sigurd was fuming, but Eivor could tell his anger wasn’t aimed at him, not really. Basim just looked baffled, like he couldn’t quite comprehend the turn the situation had taken. But he was catching up quickly and Eivor could tell he was getting ready to use that blade of his. 

“I will not be pawned off like a Thrall!”, Eivor pushed through gritted teeth. 

“Calm yourself, brother.”, Sigurd pleaded. He switched into their native norse. “If you don’t go with them, all of us die here. I don’t want you to go with them any more than you do. But we don’t have a choice.”

“It didn’t have to come to this.”, Eivor reminded him. “If you hadn’t been so obsessed with that useless stone…”

“I am sorry, brother, I truly am.” Sigurd sounded sincere. It didn’t help the situation, but it made Eivor feel better. 

“I will come back for you.” Sigurd stepped toward him and Eivor lowered his axe and relaxed as Sigurd gripped the back of his neck and let their foreheads touch. It was comforting. 

“Be strong, brother. I will get you back. I promise.” 

Eivor smiled sadly. “Look after Synin for me.”

With that he handed Sigurd his father's axe and stepped toward Fulke and Aelfred. Swords and spears were sheathed. 

“If you harm my brother, I will kill you.”, Sigurd stated with absolute confidence. Then he turned around and left, Basim following behind him. 

And then Eivor was alone. 

-

“I would like to take the Dane in my care, my Lord. I wish to… talk to him about a few things.”

“Do with him as you will, Paladin Fulke.”

“Thank you, my Lord.”

-

Eivor looked up when the cell door opened and sneered when he recognized Fulke. If he’d had his weapons, he would have tried to kill her. But shackled to the wall as he was, there wasn’t much he could do. 

“Hello Eivor.”, Fulke smiled, but there was no warmth in it. 

“Why me?” Eivor asked the question that had been eating at him since the meeting only days ago. “You were interested in Sigurd the whole time we were chasing your stone. Why choose me?”

Fulke grinned and it reminded Eivor of a hungry wolf. “Because you, Eivor, are also special. I believe you are also descended from the Gods. And Sigurd is Jarl. You are only a warrior.”

“You think he won’t come for me?” Eivor didn’t think she was that stupid. 

“That’s not it.”, Fulke said with a pitying tone. “I think that Sigurd will come, but his allies might not be as willing to risk their lives for a simple warrior.”

Eivor laughed. “If that’s what you think, you will be disappointed. Sigurd’s allies are my allies.”

“We shall see.” Fulke pulled out a ring with keys and a rope. “In the meantime, I will be taking you with me. We’ll see if there is anything of you left when Sigurd comes for you.”

-

It had been days. Probably. Eivor wasn’t sure. His throat was dry and his stomach ached with emptiness. The darkness was complete. He couldn’t see his hand if he waved it before his eyes. It was also quiet. Too quiet. Quiet enough that his head filled it with voices. Eivor had tried talking to himself to get them to stop, but his throat was dry and his voice gone. 

It was also cold. Eivor hadn’t moved from his place, curled up on the stone in what felt like forever. It was uncomfortable and his muscles ached, but moving meant exposing more skin to the cold. 

It was grating. The cold, the thirst, the hunger, the darkness, the quiet. 

But Eivor was strong. He knew he was. 

He would survive. 

Sigurd would come for him. 

He could hold until then. 

-

Eivor groaned as the whip cut his back. Criss crossed wounds were scattered all over his back by now. They tore open when he moved, they burned like fire when Fulke splashed them with salt water and they were agony when she whipped him again. 

Eivor wondered if there was any skin left on his back. 

The voice said that it was just pain.

Eivor told it to go fuck itself.

-

Eivor hated the chair. The spikes were dull enough not to cut him simply by touching them, but they were sharp enough to cut him if he moved. But after hours and hours of having them press against his back, thighs and arms, not moving was just as painful as moving. 

And so the blood kept dripping. 

Eivor gripped the arms of the chair with cramping fingers. Fingers lacking fingernails. 

Fulke kept telling him to listen to the voice. 

Eivor didn’t want to. 

He had heard it all his life. It was cruel. Just because it sounded like Odin didn’t mean it was. It was just a voice in his head. A dream. A vision. It wasn’t real.  
But it was getting harder to ignore. 

-

Eivor screamed and his voice broke long before he stopped. 

Fulke was burning him. 

The iron was glowing hot and the cell smelled of burned meat. 

Eivor wasn’t sure what was worse. When Fulke pressed the iron on his skin, or when she pulled it off and his skin came with it. 

He hated how careful she was about it. How she made sure to clean and bandage the wounds immediately so they wouldn’t get infected. If she would just make a mistake, than maybe Eivor could escape this torture. It wouldn’t be the entry to Valhalla he had hoped for, but it would be a relief nonetheless. 

\- 

There was silence again. Fulke had left him to stew in his agony, as she often did. 

Eivor sat in the chair, tears silently running down his face. 

Every part of his body hurt. 

Why couldn’t she just end it? 

Out of the corner of his eye Eivor could see him. 

Odin. Havi. 

When Eivor had begun seeing him, he had looked like an old man. The way Eivor had always seen him in his dreams. 

Now, every day, he looked more like Eivor. 

He was getting stronger. 

Eivor knew, with the same certainty that he had in dreams, that once Odin looked just like him, Eivor wouldn’t be able to keep him at bay anymore. Odin would be Eivor, and Eivor would be Odin. 

Time was running out. 

“Go away.”, Eivor rasped at the hallucination. 

It smirked. “I have waited for so long for you to embrace who you are. And now this woman is helping me achieve rebirth with or without your cooperation.”

“Fulke is mad!”, Eivor hissed. “I will not give in to you! You are just a cruel old man who was too afraid to die!”

“It wasn’t just about me, Eivor. I had to try and save my people.” Odin chastised. 

“But you didn’t. You just saved yourself and a handful of others. A great king you are, letting all your subjects die while you save yourself!” 

But Odin didn’t rise to his bait. Instead he grinned at Eivor triumphantly. And then he vanished. 

The door swung open. “A king, huh?”, Fulke said. She seemed almost impressed. 

Eivor just stared at her. It wasn’t like there was anything he could do anyways. And what was her point?

“It seems it is Havi, the High One of Asgard I must wake, then.” Fulke smiled gleefully. 

And suddenly Eivor understood at least in part. She was trying to wake the God in him. And now he had given her the information on who she needed to wake. 

-

Eivor’s head was strapped to the table. It scared him. He had been strapped to the table many times, but never his head. 

After that last conversation with Fulke, he dreaded what she would do. Why would she immobilize his head?

Fulke entered his field of vision, in her hand a spoon. Eivor looked at it in confusion. What was she… 

And then, as Odin appeared in his periphery, looking just like Eivor, except for his missing eye, Eivor understood. 

He could see in Fulke’s face the moment she saw that he knew. 

“No.”, was all that Eivor could push out, before Fulke took hold of his face and plunged in the spoon. Eivor screamed and thrashed, but there was nothing he could do. 

Fulke was tearing out his eye. He was reaching out and plucking his eye from his socket.

Fulke grinned. He placed the eye in the water and looked at Mimir. “Is it done?”

Fulke held his eye in her bloody hand. “I think Sigurd will like this present, don’t you?”

Tyr looked him over. “You’re a sight for sore eyes! What happened to yours?”

Fulke tore it out. He sacrificed it for the survival of his people. 

Eivor opened his eye and Havi did the same. 

Fulke looked at him with bright eyes and hungry curiosity. 

Eivor felt… Unbalanced. He was still in a great deal of pain, but things had changed. He had changed. He could remember… everything. Every part of his life, his childhood, training with Sigurd, screwing around with Vili, his adulthood, killing Kjotve, sailing to England… But it felt distanced. Like it happened a long time ago. And he also remembered… everything else. Sitting on his throne in Asgard, fighting Jotuns, stealing the mead, binding Fenrir, Ragnarok and the world in flames. But that also felt distant. 

He was two people at once and also neither. 

But there was one thing certain. Eivor would kill Fulke and Havi would delight in it. 

-

Eivor lay on the floor by the altar when Sigurd and Basim broke through the door. 

“Brother!”, Sigurd yelled. 

The trap door fell closed and Fulke was gone. Sigurd dropped to his knees by Eivor’s side. 

“What did that witch do to you?” Sigurd pulled him up to sit. Eivor leaned against him, he still wasn’t recovered even though Fulke had stopped much of her torture after taking his eye. 

Eivor looked at the man he considered his brother. Havi saw the man he would trust with anything. 

“You came.” He smiled. “I knew you would.”

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: Some torture (whipping, branding, lack of food and drink, ripping out finger nails), also Eivor looses an eye and has a generally shitty time.


End file.
